*Child-Woman POV*

I had begun to doubt that the Giant was the Lord of Death on the very night he roared into our lives. At first, he had seemed like an angry god as he destroyed the beasts that had kidnapped my ‘sisters’ and me. I had been shocked at the sight of the human bodies being crushed and shredded, not to mention all that blood. But I had also revelled in the sweet taste of revenge. The murdering-rapists had died in absolute agony and terror with almost nothing recognisable left of them. No doubt wild animals had feasted on their gory remains. But later in the night when I tried to emulate the Giant’s blood-thirstiness he balked. That’s when I began to notice certain mannerisms of his which made me doubt his divinity.

He walked with a loping gait which could seem sure-footed at the outset but in reality was quite clumsy. I watched on numerous occasions as he slipped and stumbled on mossy patches of the forest. I watched him unintentionally stub his toe against a large rock which even a drunkard would have known to avoid.

His way of talking was similarly ungainly. He was quick to anger when things didn’t go his way, but whenever I challenged his thinking he acted like a child caught red-handed eating sweets. Of course I never challenged him too aggressively, he was after all a Giant and I had seen the violence that he was capable of.

He was utterly amateurish in the art of surviving in the forest. Despite being the prisoners and playthings of the beasts who had kidnapped us, we women had learned how to trap and kill animals, how to skin them and separate them meat, how to identify edible plants and cook a stew, how make shelter and a fire. He did not know most of these things.

He got lucky once when a wild boar that had been utterly frightened by the sound of his loud thumping footsteps ran right into him. But usually he relied on foraging for his meals. He was not a good forager either. I once saw him pull down the oblong jakoos fruit from a tree. Even children know how poisonous the jakoos is. So I shouted and ran to his side to pull the fruit out of his hands as he brought it closer to his opening mouth. But I reached too late. I reached his side and stared in wide-eyed horror as he chewed nonchalantly on the yellow pulp. I waited for him to collapse to the ground in agony but even an hour later the only untoward thing was that he passed rancid-smelling gas and went about his business. I felt sorry for him though, he had tried to mask the sound of breaking wind, but like his natural voice even his backside voice was just too loud not to be heard. He looked red in the face as he turned away from us and pretended to be busy.

My ‘sisters’ were not as fascinated by our Giant rescuer as I was. They still seemed terrified of him and kept their distance from him. But after a week they seemed to have calmed down about their new situation and looked more at ease at the things that the Giant did.

My ‘sisters’ and I thought about venturing downhill from the forest in the first few days after we were freed. We thought about trying to head back to our villages and seeing our families again. Initially, all of us were filled with hope as we dreamed of tearful reunions. But we had learned about reality if nothing else over the past months of captivity. Our families might have been happy to see us but the village would shun us for having been violated. There would be no marriage for any of us and we would be a burden on our fathers. Despondently we decided to stay in the forest and stay with the Giant.

Our captors were not the only man-beasts roaming the ancient jungle and while we may have been able to survive in that wild place, we would not have been any better-equipped to evade being captured a second time. Staying with the Giant, we would be assured of safety at least from men. I eventually stopped calling him the Giant. His name was Vaali. Like the hero of old. He was a hero to us, of sorts. Not the most gallant hero that I used to imagine as a girl. Not a handsome, lithe man on horseback who would swoop me away from trouble and marry me. No, this was a shaggy, smelly, giant of a hero who ate poisoned fruits, stumbled over his words and legs and whose face was like a golem’s.

Vaali had made his reluctance to have us hang around known the morning after he freed us (inadvertently freed us as I’ve come to believe). While I had talked him out of his irritation that day, we ‘sisters’ knew that we had to make ourselves useful so that he would not simply disappear on us one day. Making ourselves useful was no great task at all. We began to forage the best of fruits for him as well as capturing and roasting small game. We made a fire each night which he partook in without reluctance. We also managed to stitch together a patchwork loincloth from the skins of dead animals for him and then persuaded him to part with the filthy fabric that he had been wearing as clothes. When we presented him freshly washed fabrics the next morning, he took the gift with a look of wonderment on his large, shaggy face.

It took him almost two weeks to stop and try to learn our names. Of course he started by asking me my name over breakfast. He seemed almost embarrassed in asking the question. I didn’t answer him right away. I had had a name earlier. But it was the name of a foolish, sheltered child who had her innocence stripped away. I never wanted to be that helpless girl again. As I searched my mind for a name that I thought was suitable, I remembered the story of Vaali. I recalled that he had a she-wolf companion that he had rescued on one of his Gargantuan Tasks. The she-wolf had been called Bheriya, and became an animal almost as famous as Vaali for being vicious and feral on the battlefield. A terror in her own right.

When I focused back on Vaali, I realised that as I had pondered my new name, he had become increasingly uncomfortable by my lack of response to his question. He was looking around and fidgeting and getting redder in the face. I smirked to myself and let him stew for a few more minutes before putting him out of his misery.

“I am Bheriya my Lord.”

I saw him visibly deflate as I finally responded. I laughed out loud at this not-so-much-lord-of-death. He gave me a dirty look when I laughed and then looked at my ‘sisters’ and asked for their names in a gruff voice.

Heta, Dabi and Vinua didn’t change their names like I had and looked at me curiously while telling Vaali their own names. Rinja didn’t say anything and stared out into the forest with a vacant look in her eyes. My earlier mirth disappeared. I was becoming worried about her, she had gradually withdrawn into herself over the last few days and seemed almost catatonic now.

We were a group now, not a vicious master and slaves. A Lord of Death and his she-wolves. We were still wary of all men and of Vaali as well. But he didn’t seem like he would hurt us like the bandits had. And anyway even if he did, I had no doubt that I would cut him and make him regret meeting us before he crushed me.